"I’m too sacred for the sinners/And the saints wish I would leave." - Mark Heard

Thursday, August 23, 2007

More Music Stuff (snore)

I just listened to Ben Fold Five's Whatever and Ever, Amen for the first time in a long time. For some reason, the album just opened up for me. While it wasn't the first time I've enjoyed the album with headphones I'm sure this helped in making the bass sound leap out and meaning of the songs suddenly pop into focus. I mean, I subconsciously knew most of the lyrics and had a general awareness of what each song was about but this time everything clicked. And then there was hearing and appreciating all the nice touches like clarinets, cellos, brushed drums and upright bass. It's about as much fun as one is allowed to have at work.

While I'm not a rabid Ben Folds fan I sincerely believe that he is a master songcrafter. The man can write melodies and put a song together like few peers. Plus you add in his penchant for melancholy melodies and I'm there. Now that he had kids he's going the route of the family friendly soundtrack, which in most ways is good. I mean, his early habit of throwing superflous swear words into his songs did help in marketing him as "angsty" and "Not Your Fathers Piano Player" but in the long run they did little to service the song. And anyone who knows me knows that I'm all about servicing the song. I have no clue what that means.

Or possibly the illumination comes from me switching to WinAmp because Windows Media Player 11 doesn't work with Last.FM and WMP version 10 doesn't work my "operating system"... although they played well together last week before the latest Windows update.